First Division. Normally, the Czechoslovak league was fairly equal and without big internal division, so this remained. One team, though, was way above the rest and dominated the championship.
Dynamo (Ceske Budejovice) were down on their luck – last with 20 points. Relegated and that was hardly a surprise – Dynamo meandered between First and Second divisions. They were promoted by default two years ago – Zbrojovka (Brno) won then the league, but was denied promotion and Dynamo climbed up instead. They escaped relegation by 1 points in the previous season, but not this time.
Skoda (Plzen) was the other unfortunate – 15th with 23 points and relegated. They were just promoted from Second Division and sunk back to it immediately. As a matter of curiosity, both relegated teams represented the cities most internationally famous for their beer.
Sigma (Olomouc) managed to survive – 14th with 25 points. For the moment, this was fine.
Tatran (Presov) – 13th with 26 points. Their usual lowly position, happy to avoid relegation.
ZVL (Zilina) – 12th with 27 points. Similar to Tatran, as always.
Spartak TAZ (Trnava) – 11th with 27 points. In deep decline already for years, like Slovak football in general, but so far clinging to First Division, unlike the Bratislava and Kosice clubs.
ASVS Dukla – but also given as VTJ Dukla, popularly called just Dukla (Banska Bystrica) – 10th with 28 points.
ASVS Dukla – but rarely even written that way, for Dukla (Prague) is Dukla (Prague). Good squad, weak season, most likely temporary weakness – 9th with 30 points.
Plastika (Nitra) – 8th with 30 points. Not a bad season for them.
Slavia IPS (Prague) – 7th with 31 points. In the Slavia’s mythology they were constant victims dirung the whole Communist period of the country, so nothing new here – mid-table position.
Ruda hvezda (Cheb) – 6th with 32 point. Not bad.
Banik (Ostrava) – 5th with 33 points. Not as strong as they used to, but seemingly avoiding major decline.
DAC (Dunajska Streda) – 4th with 34 points. Now, they were the big pleasant surprise. Practically unknown outside Czechoslovakia club, which was promoted to the top league for the first time in 1984-85. Now they were 4th and not just that.
Bohemians CKD (Prague) – 3rd with 35 points. Well done, even if their success was mostly due to the relative weakness of other clubs. One cannot be very harsh on them, though – the smallest of the Prague clubs never had a chance to build a squad of stars and strong seasons were always more a matter of brave spirit than anything else. Lovely underdogs beating the odds.
Given their squad, it was quite expected that the last year champions would not be able to repeat their success – it was pretty much the same team and TJ Vitkovice was hardly the city – and therefore, the club – capable to attract big talent. 2nd with 37 points – looking like keeping leadership, but most likely just going on inertia: they really fought and succeeded winning silver medals. Not able to challenge the leaders at all.
Sparta CKD (Prague) easily won the championship – they won 18 games, tied 6, lost 6, scored 63 goals and allowed only 17 in their own net. With 42 points, they left TJ Vitkovice 5 points behind. Their goal-difference of +46 practically tells all: the next best goal-difference belonged to Slavia (Ptague) and it was only +19. Third-place Bohemians ended with +8! Of course, Sparta had the best squad – Chovanec, Skuhravy, Nemecek, Stejskal, Hasek, Straka, the crème of the 1980s Czechoslovak best players. It was also incredibly strong period for the club and it was clear that they will continue to lead.